"file allocation table bad drive C"

  • Thread starter Thread starter Cheryl
  • Start date Start date
C

Cheryl

I have an IBM ThinkPad that is suddenly unbootable.

It cycles endlessly through restarting itself without
ever getting to Windows 2000 on the hard drive.

Using a floppy, I've been able to boot to a dos prompt.

I can see the C drive with its files and directories.
However when I do a dir on the winnt directory, it lists
the files and then says:
"file allocation table bad, drive C"

I tried an anti-vrus boot disk and it errored on hundreds
of files because it couldn't read them. Many file names
were "random" ascii characters.

So, assuming I have a corrupt FAT, is there anything that
can be done? I believe I've seen tools that claim to do
this...if so, do they work and is that the only (or best)
option?

Thanks for any help,
Cheryl
 
If you want the files back, you poor thing :)

Copy scandisk on a boot floppy and use it to scan the drive. (W95 OSR2,
W98 or better, you have FAT 32 I assume).

If you want the machine back.

My best advice would be to format it to NTFS (it doesn't get bad), check
the disk physically and then re-install Windows.
 
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